(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a peripheral component interconnect express (hereinafter referred to as a “PCI express” or “PCIe”) switch apparatus and a method of controlling a connection thereof.
(b) Description of the Related Art
PCI express technology is technology for interfacing input/output (I/O) between a central processing unit (CPU) and a peripheral device within a computer system. Such PCI express technology was initially applied to an interface using a chip-to-chip or a slot, but currently, in order to extend a PCI express interface to the outside, a method of extending the PCI express interface to the outside using a PCI express cable or other copper and optic cable has been introduced. Thereby, the PCI express interface can be used as an extension interface to the outside as well as the inside of a computer system. Particularly, a method of transmitting a PCI express signal together with a video signal using a new copper cable such as a thunderbolt cable has been introduced.
In the conventional art that transmits a PCI express signal to a cable, a signal that is defined as a PCI express specification using a PCI express switch is generally used. However, in view of a characteristic of a method of controlling a connection to a multiple lane of PCI express, when using a cable having several paths so as to transmit and receive a signal using a multiple cable or to transmit and receive a multiple signal, if a problem occurs in one of a multiple signal transmitting/receiving path on each lane basis, a transmitting/receiving speed may rapidly decrease, or it may be impossible to transmit and receive. Particularly, when a transmitting path is short, if a problem occurs, by replacing a cable or a device that causes the problem, the problem can be solved, but when a transmitting path is a long distance such as 100 m-10 km, if a problem occurs, a device can be replaced, but there is much difficulty in replacing a cable and thus a case of inevitably stopping a service may occur.
However, in a method of using an existing PCI express switch, a method of transmitting and receiving a PCI express signal in a cable is selected, and thus when a failure occurs in some transmitting path, there is no countermeasure for the failure and a solution is thus requested.